This is hilarious (US foreign policy)

[Ned]

OneFoot, IIRC, the breakup of Yugoslavia into independent states was followed in every circumstance by Serb aggression to restore the break-away republic to Yugoslav contol. In Bosnia, this particularly resulted in atrocity after attrocity, mainly committed by the Serbs. IIRC, after the settlement in Bosnia, the same thing began to occur in Kosovo. I believe Nato had had enough of Serbia by this time. When Serbia refused an international force to restore peace to Kosovo, Nato began the bombing of Serbia.

If I do not understand these facts correctly, please let me know.

One of the Serb's on this board said that all Serbia was trying to do in Kosovo was deal with an illegal immigration problem. I suppose what he meant was that Serbia had the legal right to forceably expel from Kosovo all of Albanian descent. Since this was a majority of the population there, the result would be human suffering on a catastrophic scale.

But again, I might be understanding this incorrectly.

But if I do understand this correctly, then the majority in Serbia must think that they had the full right to evict or slaughter Albanians in Kosova. This disturbs me.

[OneFootInTheGrave]

Ok I managed to fin a short excerpt in english

http://www.hina.hr/nws-bin/genews.cgi?TOP=ehot&NID=ehot/politika/H8142399.2yc

however the implications are explained much cleaner in other Croatian news.

[DinoDoc]

It's the same request made to the Serbs. I'd be most interested in if you can find a source that says the US is offering to obstruct the tribunal investigating the Yugoslav war.

[OneFootInTheGrave]

Originally posted by Ned
OneFoot, IIRC, the breakup of Yugoslavia into independent states was followed in every circumstance by Serb aggression to restore the break-away republic to Yugoslav contol. In Bosnia, this particularly resulted in atrocity after attrocity, mainly committed by the Serbs. IIRC, after the settlement in Bosnia, the same thing began to occur in Kosovo. I believe Nato had had enough of Serbia by this time. When Serbia refused an international force to restore peace to Kosovo, Nato began the bombing of Serbia.

If I do not understand these facts correctly, please let me know.

One of the Serb's on this board said that all Serbia was trying to do in Kosovo was deal with an illegal immigration problem. I suppose what he meant was that Serbia had the legal right to forceably expel from Kosovo all of Albanian descent. Since this was a majority of the population there, the result would be human suffering on a catastrophic scale.

But again, I might be understanding this incorrectly.

But if I do understand this correctly, then the majority in Serbia must think that they had the full right to evict or slaughter Albanians in Kosova. This disturbs me.

Well it is obviously not that simple, but in my view (and don't forget I am a Croat that has been bombed for 2 weeks non-stop by Serbs in 1991/1992, so maybe I am a bit biased) so still.

1. Milosevic had a plan to subdue the terrirories that were Yugoslavia than, prior to 1990. He had a control of Yugoslav army effectivley, and a few other aces in the sleeve.

2. The wars were - Slovenia - two weeks, it was clear they cannot do anything there trough Croatia,
3 - Croatia - 1991 to 1995, together with Serb minority in Croatia (mainly as a local uprising with the help of Yugoslav army) they held 1/3 od Croatian territory for those four years, and expelled everyone non-Serb from those terrirories for the time, in 1995. Croats freed the territory and all 150 000 Serbs that were there (probably 90% ) fled fearing retribution and trying to get Yugoslavia (Serbia actually by than) directly into a open war, which Milosevic to his credit did not start. So that finished (with the help from US in training and their bombing campaign in Bosnia at the time)
4. 1992 -1995/6 Bosnia. That was a messy affair, even though Serbs started the initial fighting against Croats and Muslims, Bosnian Croats (helped by Croatian regime in Zagreb too) soon felt they had an upper hand of the Muslims so Croats started fightig Muslims too in an attempt to gain territory. So for a while it was a three way war with coallitions being forged differently on different fronts. Overall Serbs were winning so at the point in time they had 79% of Bosnia I think (and at the same time they held 1/3 of Croatia too). However being kicked Muslims and Croats united again and with first NATO boming campaigns and Croatian State action in Croatia, Croats and Muslims in Bosnia regained the territory quicly in 1995, and so it stayed according to Dayton peace accords. 51% Croats and Muslims, 49 % Serbs.

5 Kosovo, While Croatia and Bosnia were different states where allegedly local Serb population was just fighting for their rights, Kosovo was an internal Serbian problem. On kosovo there was 1 million + aAlbanians which was around 90% of population there and probably around 20% of total population of what was left of Yugoslavia. So what really happened there I am not sure, as I was allready in UK when it all went on. But my felling is if it was left unattended by NATO the Serbs would move those 90% out of there to Albania presumably as they have been quite successful with ethnic clensing where they conquered in previous two wars, Croatia and Bosnia so I don't doubt a minute that this was not the goal. So NATO stepped in and kick their ass as they did not want to comply.

And Serbs percieve NATO as bombing them and US as NATO leader and instigator of the whole thing. And don't forget that normal Serb while thinking that Milosevic was bad, still did not have a clue what was happening on the terrain in the war, and bombs that were falling on their factories and bridges - is certainly a personal thing. So no suprise for the sentiment there.

I think it is hard for Serbs to accept that the most likely action of what Milosevic planned than would be ethnically clean Kosovo (not that they would mind too much though many would still object -not that they could do much, as you might guess Albanians were never that popular anyway), especially now as it did not happen due to NATO action, but there is now hardly any Serbs living there now, so ethnic clensing the other way around... two edged sword so to say. However I am happy from my position as it helped remove Milosevic in my view and now finally I think that the area is stable for good, - at least Serbia/ Croatia./Bosnia part that is close to me, Kosovo is still far from stable as they have to sort out the proper political solution for the enclave.

but here it is... a short breakdown

[Lawrence of Arabia]

European hypocracy at its greatest: we want you (US) to help us get these war criminals, but we refuse to help you/support you with any part of your foreign affairs
US hypocracy at its finest: we dont want you (European Community/World) to put our boys in prison, but we want your help in a war against iraq/war on terrorism/war on drugs/war on blah blah.

Go figure

[OneFootInTheGrave]

Originally posted by DinoDoc
It's the same request made to the Serbs. I'd be most interested in if you can find a source that says the US is offering to obstruct the tribunal investigating the Yugoslav war.

Obviously not directly, however in Croatian newspapers - there is a paragraph about I will quote and translate here:

Prije nego što se saznalo da je slièan prijedlog upuæen i Hrvatskoj, u Zagreb je u službeni posjet došao amerièki veleposlanik za pitanja ratnih zloèina Richard Prosper. Ustvrdio je da æe SAD pomoæi hrvatskom pravosuðu kako bi ono bilo sposobno samo procesuirati sluèajeve ratnih zloèina, a neke èak prebaciti iz Haaga u Hrvatsku.
Haaško tužiteljstvo odmah je reagiralo na takve najave ustvrdivši da ne namjerava prepustiti hrvatskom pravosuðu nijedan proces koji priprema.

roughly translated: Before we found out that a similar suggestion (the bilateral treaty) was sent to Croatia, there was an official visit to Zagreb by American Ambassador for war crimes Richard Prosper. He said that USA will help Croatian courts in order to be able to process the war crime case on its own, and even some cases to transfer from Hague to Croatia.
Haag judges reacted straight away on such comments and said that they do not intend to let Croatian Courts handle any single case it (the tribunal) wants to handle.

Anyway - I think you can see the intention now, adding in the Croatian political situation at the moment. Especially as it is US initiative... interesting indeed. It would make me feel sick if the government fell because of this initiative, as possibly this could make a few members of parliament change their mind. Don't forget that Croatia is a new democracy and that there is around 10 different parties in the parlament, nicely divided (and from the last crisis, mostly the division line goes on Hague handling), a government party split in half, as if they did all do as its party leader requested the government would fall. And that would mean end of collaboration wiht Hague, at least a stop in current good working relations. But half of the party split and supported the gov. so it stayed and it continues with the reforms.

Anyway - the last administraion was the : Hague and nothing else song.

This one is -else, else- there are alternatives.

that would result in this

Croatia cannot oblige itself to extradite its own citizens to the UN war crimes tribunal in The Hague and yet not do the same with foreign citizens regardless of which country they come from. Croatia is in a delicate position because it has an additional obligation compared to other EU aspirants and that is to co-operate with the Hague-based Tribunal which is going well and the Croatian Government takes it seriously. As such the American demand leaves little manoeuvring space, Plevnik said.

This is just one example of single minded foreign policy that can have big impact on local politics, and as a result a dislike of the US/ US policies with a good reason. And it is a good example of one-sidedness US shows.

[Ned]

OneFoot, I assume that the average Serban believes that all they were trying to do was put down the KLA and restore law and order to Kosovo. They must have been fairly unaware of Serb attrocities and ethnic cleansing action in Kosovo which were consistent with prior Serb ethnic cleansing acts in Croatia and Bosnia.

But, I understand that once the KLA got the upper hand in Kosovo, they committed attrocities of their own against the Serbs. This is regrettable.

I remember a huge debate here in the United States on whether we should get involved at all (Kissinger was against) or whether once the action started we should use ground troops (McCain was in favor).

It is hard at times to know the full truth of a matter given that so much of what we hear is biased propaganda. But it does seem that with Nato forces in Kosovo, the violence has largely died down.

It is a pity that we had to kill, let alone hurt, any Serb to fix Kosovo.

[DinoDoc]

Personally if I were in charge, these requests for immunity would only be prefaced with the serious threat of removing the peacekeepers. It would remove the need for pointless horsetrading.

Ned: Under the international law that OFITG seems to hold dear, we had no right to intervene in the Kosovo situation.

[Ned]

OneFoot, I can understand the problem the government of Croatia has with the US proposal. The US was an initial sponsor of the Hague War Crimes panel, and a strong supporter of the ICC - that is, - until they tried to indict Clinton for US actions in Kosovo. This effort to get Clinton has lead to an American insistance that peacekeeping efforts be exluded. But, this does seem like a double-standard, particularly if attrocities like Sebrenicia happen simply because some Dutch commander doesn't want to pick up the phone and ask for help when he is outgunned.

The effort to indict Clinton was polictically motivated, but the investigation of Dutch malfeasance, in my view, is not.

The only way that I can see to keep politically motivated indictments from going anywhere is to have UN Security Council approval of any trials. Clinton proposed this during the negotiation of the ICC. This proposal was rejected. Recently, Bush renewed this same request with the SC. We got only a one year repreive.

However, both Clinton and Bush are fundamentally correct on this issue. We really need to have SC approval of trials. Until this is accepted, the US has no choice but to seek bilateral treaties such as the one sent to Croatia.

[Ned]

Originally posted by DinoDoc
Personally if I were in charge, these requests for immunity would only be prefaced with the serious threat of removing the peacekeepers. It would remove the need for pointless horsetrading.

Ned: Under the international law that OFITG seems to hold dear, we had no right to intervene in the Kosovo situation.

Because it was not an "international threat?"

[DinoDoc]

This article might explain things better than I could: The Kosovo Situation and NATO Military Action

[Capt Dizle]

Personally, I don't care what any European ****kickers think, our boys aren't gonna be subject to no interstinkingnational tribunal.

[Dr Strangelove]

No jury trial. No appeals. No cross examination of witnesses. No habeas corpus . No legislative hearing process used to select judges. The body of law to be written by the judiciary without so much as legislative or executive approval. Honestly, is this the standard of government in the EU or Canada? I'm willing to bet that if a country with this system of government applied to join the EU it would be turned down unanimously, yet the ICC is being foisted off on the world at large.

Apparently there is some sort of codicil in the ICC's mandate that condemns "forced pregnancy", i.e., preventing a woman from obtaining an abortion. I can't wait until the court tries shoving this down the throats of the Islamic world. Do they have any really tall buildings in the Netherlands?

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by Dr Strangelove
Apparently there is some sort of codicil in the ICC's mandate that condemns "forced pregnancy", i.e., preventing a woman from obtaining an abortion. I can't wait until the court tries shoving this down the throats of the Islamic world.

Aren't you forgeting the Vatican as well?

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by DinoDoc
Aren't you forgeting the Vatican as well?

I can't quite envision papal legates using jumbo jets as bombs.